The Culture Bus – Key Takeaways From A Rollercoaster Ride Season

Our lacrosse season wrapped up this past week. I appreciate you following my ride, a wild one with many ups and downs it has been.

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Here are my key takeaways as I look back over the journey:

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1 – Crucial Conversations – I had a good heart to heart conversation with the head coach about two-thirds of the way through the season. I was really honest with my frustrations and he received the feedback very well. Things weren’t perfect after this, but they were significantly better. My biggest regret is that I did not have the courage to have this conversation much, much earlier in the season. As I embark on the new adventure to start a new team – the importance of communication strategies within the coaching staff and dealing with different opinions in a healthy wayhas become one of, if not the most important strategy as we assemble a coaching staff.

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2 – Positive energy/ Icebreakers – Starting every practice with some type of teambuilder/icebreaker/positive energy activity was very successful. I kept a list of what we did and some other ideas as well, reply back to this email if you want me to shoot you a copy of that (it’s in an Excel spreadsheet, and hopefully you can decipher my notes.)

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3 – Leadership Development – Reading The Hard Hat by Jon Gordon with the seniors, and having them present the ideas back to the team was a huge success. I had several of the seniors come up to me at the banquet and tell me how much that book meant to them.

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4 – The importance of a coach – As I observed many of the boys’ reactions and body language to how they were being coached, I was reminded of what a huge opportunity we have as coaches. We can tear them down and belittle them, or we can pour into them and love them and let them know how much we believe in them. In their successes, and more importantly in their failures, we can help them develop a growth mindset where they truly believe they have the ability to accomplish great things on and off the field.

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I am excited to stay in touch with these players and hopefully be able to continue to push them and support them in any way I can.

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Thank you again for following along this journey, I will probably do the same thing and share my experiences starting later this summer as we lay the foundations for our new team. It’s definitely going to be an #Epic2017!!

Hi Craig,
Your podcasts are the best ! I would love to receive a copy of your “Positive energy/ Icebreakers – Starting every practice with some type of teambuilder/icebreaker/positive energy activities” .
THANKS.